Spring 2027

AMST 2435 – Coming of Age in the U.S.

TR 12:30 – 1:45pm  

David Coyoca

What does it mean to grow up in contemporary America? This course examines coming-of-age stories — in films like Moonlight and The Florida Project, albums like Lorde’s Pure Heroine and Olivia Rodrigo’s discography, and the social media platforms that shape how a generation understands itself — to ask what these texts reveal about the institutions, structures, and relationships that make growing up possible.

Requirements Designation: Historical Studies

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive, & Philosophical Inquiry; Historical Perspectives

AMST 2559 – Global Traditional Medicine

TR 9:30 – 10:45 AM

Anneleise Azua

This course explores traditional medicine and healing practices around the world, asking who gets to define medicine and how culture, race, colonialism, and power shape healing. Through global case studies, students examine Indigenous and other traditional healing systems alongside Western medicine, with attention to cultural appropriation, ethics, consent, and the protection of sacred knowledge.

Class Attributes: Cultures & Societies of the World

AMST 2660 – Spirituality in America

MW 2:00 – 2:50 PM

Matthew Hedstrom

What does "spiritual but not religious" mean, and why has it become such a pervasive self-description in contemporary America? This interdisciplinary course surveys spirituality in America, with a particular eye for the relationship between spirituality and formal religion, on the one hand, and secular modes of understanding the self, such as psychology, on the other.

Discussion Sections 101 - 115

Requirements Designation: Historical Studies

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive, & Philosophical Inquiry; Historical Perspectives

AMST 3180 – Intro to Asian American Studies

MW 9:00 – 9:50 AM

Sylvia Chong

An interdisciplinary introduction to the culture and history of Asians and Pacific Islanders in America. Examines ethnic communities such as Chinese, Japanese, Filipino, Korean, Asian Indian, and Native Hawaiian, through themes such as immigration, labor, cultural production, war, assimilation, and politics. Texts are drawn from genres such as legal cases, short fiction, musicals, documentaries, visual art, and drama.

Discussion Sections 101 – 104

Requirements Designation: Historical Studies

Class Attributes: Cultures & Societies of the World; Historical Perspectives

AMST 3280/ANTH 3280 – Intro to Native Studies

MW 10:00 – 10:50 AM

Kasey Jernigan

An intro to the broad field of Native Studies, this class focuses on themes of representation and erasure. We read Indigenous scholars and draw from current events, pop culture, and historical narrative to explore complex relationships between historical and contemporary issues that Indigenous peoples face in the US. We examine the foundations of Native representations and their connections to critical issues in Native communities.

Course Attributes: Cultures & Societies of the World Historical Perspectives

AMST 3326 – Latinx and Indigenous Environmentalisms

TR 2:00 – 3:15 PM

Anneleise Azua

This course examines the relationship between Latinx and Indigenous communities and the environment from a sociocultural, anthropological and historical perspective.Texts encompass the fields of history, anthropology, sociology, environmental studies, and often require thinking and analysis that questions understandings of land, development, race, science, health, and wellness on a state, local, and international level.

Requirements Designation: Historical Studies

Class Attributes: Cultures & Societies of the World; Historical Perspectives

AMST 3428 – Race, Gender, and Music

TR 9:30 – 10:45 AM

Fiona Ngo

This class explores the political connections between race, gender, and music. The course considers questions of representation, the practice and politics of listening, the political and economic modes of production, and racial formation. In order to explore these topics, this version of the course is broken into three thematic sections: Sound, Score, and Structure. The course is taught intersectionally, meaning we will deal with issues of race, gender, sexuality, labor, and national identity.  

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive, & Philosophical Inquiry

AMST 3472 – Hollywood Exile: German Filmmakers Flee Fascism

TR 12:30 – 1:45 PM

Paul Dobryden

In the 1930s, many people employed in the German film industry whose lives were threatened by Nazism took refuge in Hollywood. This course examines the contributions exiled directors, writers, actors, and others made in genres ranging from comedy and melodrama to film noir. In addition to indicting fascism and reflecting on the trauma of forced migration these films often turned a critical eye on the U.S..

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive, & Philosophical Inquiry; Historical Perspectives

AMST 3559 – Cults, Conspiracies, and Deep Fakes

TR 12:30 – 1:45 PM

Fiona Ngo

What makes us want to believe in something extraordinary? This course covers contemporary and historical examples of cults, conspiracies, and deep fakes. We will address the social context and appeal of wanting to BELIEVE, and the roles that technology, spirituality, politics, consumerism, and media literacy play. Classroom time will be organized around mutual respect, discussion, intellect, and creativity.

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive & Philosophical Inquiry

AMST 3559 – Coogler’s America: Examining Films of Ryan Coogler

TR 11:00 AM – 12:15 PM

David Coyoca

This course examines representations of race and gender across the films of Ryan Coogler. We will analyze each of his films alongside companion films and critical essays that situate his work within the larger cultural landscape.

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive & Philosophical Inquiry

AMST 3610 – Asian Americans & Pop Culture

TR 12:30 – 1:45 PM

Patricia Nguyen  

Asian Americans and Popular Culture surveys a history of Asian American racialization, experiences, and subject formation in the United States through film, comics, TV, theatre, music, public protest, sports, and social media. Students will learn how to analyze and develop creative work to respond to and re/frame debates on the politics of representation, exoticization, cultural appropriation, transnationalism, hybridity, and US immigration laws.

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive, & Philosophical Inquiry; Social & Economic Systems

AMST 3630 – Vietnam War Literature & Film

MW 2:00 – 3:15 PM

Sylvia Chong

In the US, Vietnam signifies not a country but a lasting syndrome that haunts American politics and society, from foreign policy to popular culture. But what of the millions of Southeast Asian refugees the War created? What are the lasting legacies of the Vietnam War for Southeast Asian diasporic communities? We will examine literature and film (fictional and documentary) made by and about Americans, Vietnamese, Cambodians, Laotians, and Hmong.

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive, & Philosophical Inquiry; Historical Perspectives

AMST 3650/ARTH 3559 – Visual Cultures of the Americas

MW 3:30 – 4:45 PM

Cole Rizki

Visual Cultures of the Americas examines photography as a contested site of knowledge, power, and resistance from the 19th century to the present. Through UVA's special collections and Fralin Museum collections alongside other materials, the course explores how photography has enabled capture and state violence while also equipping communities to forge identities, create counter-archives, resist oppression, and envision alternative worlds.

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive, & Philosophical Inquiry; Cultures & Societies of the World

AMST 4325 – 001 – The Politics of Breath

TR 3:30 – 4:45 PM

Patricia Nguyen

Politics of Breath explores the embodied impacts of histories of colonialism, imperialism, war, genocide, racism, and climate change. From the respiratory pandemic of COVID-19 to the Black Lives Matter movement to AI data centers we will explore environmental injustice, air pollution, and the art of living in these times. Throughout the course, students will cultivate a relationship to individual and collective breath as an essential element of life and practice of worldmaking.    

Class Attributes: Artistic, Interpretive, & Philosophical Inquiry; Social & Economic Systems

AMST 4500 – Land & Health of Native America

MW 2:00 – 3:15PM  

Kasey Jernigan

This seminar is intended to focus study, research, and discussion on a single period, topic, or issue, such as the Great Awakening, the Civil War, the Harlem Renaissance, the Great Depression, or the 1960s. Topics vary.

Class Attributes: Social & Economic Systems

AMST 4559/LAST 4559–001 – The Art of Revolution: 20th & 21st Century Social Movements

MW 5:00 – 6:15 PM

Cole Rizki

How do people come together to create social change? How do visual and performance practices shape political struggle? This course examines social movements across the 20th and 21st centuries in the Americas. Drawing from visual culture and performance studies, we explore how movements organize, articulate demands, and mobilize communities through images, performance, and other embodied practices while exploring the historical and political conditions that give rise to collective action.

Traditional Curriculum: Humanities & Historical Studies  

Course Disciplines: Artistic, Interpretation & Critical Thinking

AMST 4559/ANTH 3559–003 – Digital Storytelling: Intersectional Feminisms

T 3:30 – 6:00 PM

Kasey Jernigan

Grounded in Black and Indigenous feminist methodologies, this course approaches storytelling as relational, ethical, and accountable practice rather than extraction. Together, we ask: What stories do landscapes hold? Whose histories have been rendered visible or invisible? How might digital storytelling contribute to the ongoing work of re-storying lands and institutions shaped by colonialism and slavery?

AMST 4999–001 – DMP Thesis Seminar

R 4:00PM – 6:30 PM  

David Coyoca

This workshop is for American Studies majors who have been admitted to the DMP program. Students will discuss the progress of their own and each other's papers, with particular attention to the research and writing processes. At the instructor's discretion, students will also read key works in the field of American Studies.  

Prerequisites: admission to DMP.

AMST 5232/HIUS 5232 – Oral History Workshop: A Hands-On Approach to Researching the Past

M 3:30 – 6:00 PM

Grace Hale

The course is run as a workshop, a space for students to learn oral history methodologies in a hands-on manner. In partnership with local/regional organizations, students will learn to conduct interviews and related research, which may include completing historical surveys, doing genealogical work, and completing archival or database research. Students will learn new skills while helping expand historical archives and knowledge of regional history.

AMST 5500/ENGL 5580 – 001 – Material Culture: Theories and Methods

W 3:30 PM – 6:00 PM

Lisa Goff

“Material culture” is the stuff of everyday life: landscapes and street corners, skyscrapers and log cabins, umbrellas and dining room tables and Picassos and Fitbits. Every thing in our lives, those we choose and those that are thrust upon us, conveys meaning—many meanings, in fact, from the intentions of the creator to the reception (and sometimes the subversion) of the consumer. Interpreting objects, buildings, and places provides insight into the values and beliefs of societies and cultures past and present. In this course we will study theories of material culture, many of which now intersect with literary criticism, from a variety of scholarly disciplines including anthropology, historical archaeology, art history, geography, environmental humanities, American Studies, and literary studies. And we will apply those theories to texts and artifacts of all kinds, from novels and short stories to movies, photographs, historic sites, visual art and culture, fashion and clothing, landscapes, parks and monuments, and more. We will read theorists familiar to students of literature, such as thing theorist Bill Brown, but also folklorist Henry Glassie; archaeologist James Deetz; anthropologists such as Elizabeth Chin; and political theorist Jane Bennett. The class will prepare you to interpret things in ways that illuminate texts, and to read texts in ways that reveal and cultivate the meanings of things.

AMST 8001 - Approaches to American Studies

T 3:30 – 6:00 PM

Jack Hamilton

This course introduces graduate students to the field of American Studies, the interdisciplinary study of US culture. Students will be exposed to a variety of influential theoretical and methodological interventions that have occurred over the field's history, and will also be introduced to some of the principal intellectual, political, and professional issues they will face while pursuing a career in the field.